Darin's New N1-Mono Project - WildThing 22, Rev. 002

[Darin Jordan]

I'm working on putting together a new N1 Mono, mostly to use for 2-Lap or SAW racing. EVERYTHING on this boat is going to be MINIMAL... engineered to be as light as possible, and purpose built to take advantage of the new ROAR Brushless "Stock" power systems.

Nothing is going into this boat that doesn't absolutely have to be there (no extra Velcro, wiring, fasteners, etc.).

My current N1 WildThing weighs right around 1.7lbs ready to throw into the water, but is setup for direct-drive. (See attached picture. NOTE: The "N1" shield on the boat was to get the timing lights to trip during a 2-Lap in California. Boat was too low to the water and the lights would not trigger without it... )

The new version will be using an overdrive to get the prop speed up and take advantage of the torque of the BL package. We'll have to see where the weight comes in on this new one.

First up, here is the completed hardware package. All carbon fiber. Brian Buaas made me the geardrive and strut. The brackets, rudder, and turn-fin were layed up and fabbed by me. I still need to fab up an aluminum cone for the nose of the strut. Current one is made from brass, so it's extra weight that doesn't need to be there.

[sailr]

Wow! Impressive Darin! The hardware is off the charts! You guys are just too talented for words! Good luck!

What motor, and esc will be used? Did you scratch build the hull or is it a kit? What sort of speeds are being reached with N-1? I can't imagine with only 3.7V!!!

[Darin Jordan]

Wow! Impressive Darin! The hardware is off the charts! You guys are just too talented for words! Good luck!

What motor, and esc will be used? Did you scratch build the hull or is it a kit? What sort of speeds are being reached with N-1? I can't imagine with only 3.7V!!!

Actually, it's 2S... 7.4V

Motor is a Losi 17.5 BL. ESC is currently going to be a Barracuda 80 without water cooling (weight). May switch up to a Castle MAMBA or maybe even a Novak HAVOC, which have more timing options and boost features. Not sure how necessary that is when just running WOT, and I have gearing to play with so motor KV isn't really as important, since I can change the prop speed to whatever I want. I do have a NOVAK SS Pro 17.5 motor setup as well, but I really don't believe that it's the motor choice that's going to matter with these truly "spec" setups. They are all about 2200KV, with strictly controlled internal dims. Setup and ESC, etc., are more important.

Hull was layed up by Brian Buaas. It's a carbon/Kevlar composite. Hull, with deck, hatch cover, and 2-part foam installed, weighs about 7oz (I'll get exact weights and list them along with some hull pics.)


My current 2-Lap N1-Mono time is 53.06 seconds... That was with the original boat shown in the pics above (silver deck)... However, we thing there were some driveline issues, causing a bunch of drag, that really held it back. My N1-Hydro record is 41.09 seconds, and things didn't even get warm. Bill Oxidean just bested that same N1-Hydro's SAW record with passes of 43 and 45mph, which is AMAZING, especially since he was running direct-drive... 2200KV with a 7.4V power system. WOW.

Cranked things up a bit with my N1-Hydro for this weekends 2-Lap event, so I expect that I should be able to better that previous time. Thrashing a little to get this N1-Mono together in time for the weekend, but I'm not going to shortcut it to get it done. May take it out there without strakes or time-tabs, however, but I've been wanting to run a mono that way anyhow to see what the effects are, so we'll see.

[Darin Jordan]

For the strut and rudder brackets, and the turn-fin, with some helpful advice/instruction from Brian Buaas, I fab'd up my own carbon fiber angle, using a heavy piece of machined aluminum channel and some aluminum angle as a former/mold. Made two thicknesses... One about 6-layers of 6oz Carbon, the other three layers, with a layer of 1.5oz glass herringbone weave in between. Both worked out to have nearly perfect 90-degree angles!

Used the heavier material for the brackets, and the thinner for the turn fin. Really pretty easy to do this, and LOADs cheaper than buying pre-made.

The other shots here are of the geardrive setup and flooded .047 wire stuffing tube arrangement installed, as well as the strut assembly being mocked up on the transom.

[Steven Vaccaro]

Very nice! What keeps water from coming in the larger tube?

[AndyKunz]

It just goes so fast the water doesn't know there's a boat coming

Andy

[Darin Jordan]

Very nice! What keeps water from coming in the larger tube?

Nothing... it's sealed at the front end, and, once the boat is underway, it comes back out...

[RIPFENCE]

awesome i love the less is more approach...nice job

[Darin Jordan]

I got everything installed and assembled tonight, and have the boat ready for it's first trials, which will be this Saturday, weather permitting. Once I see how everything works and I get it all sorted out, I'll figure out some paint for the sides and maybe the bottom. For now, it's going as is, though I may put a sticker or two on it.

Total weight, ready to run, minus hatch tape, is 1lb 9.6oz. This should be VERY interesting. :D

I'm not getting my hopes too high just yet, as it doesn't have strakes or trim tabs, so doing a decent pair of 1/6th mile laps might be a little tough to do, but we'll see. If the hull handles well and runs freely, it should be QUITE fast.

Every faster is JUST long enough and I've only used them were absolutely required. Servo and turn fin are currently held in with double-stick waterproof tape. Velcro is ONLY where it's absolutely needed. There isn't even a doubler in the transom, only some carbon doublers under the strut and rudder mounting, and I drilled and tapped that carbon directly so there would be no need for nuts on the inside of the hull. Steering servo is a 6oz weight Spektrum DP60 Ultra-Micro with only 13.2oz of torque, and the steering rod was fabbed from a piece of .047 stainless wire. Steering was laid out to be as short as practical.

This should be fun!

[Darin Jordan]

A couple more shots...

[Steven Vaccaro]

I thought you gave up on a carbon rudder?

[eboat]

Darin

If you have done all this to save weight why did you not turn the lipo over (sticker side down) and then you could shorten the power wires by half

[Darin Jordan]

Darin

If you have done all this to save weight why did you not turn the lipo over (sticker side down) and then you could shorten the power wires by half

But, if I did that, how would I be able to show off the ThunderPower R/C 45C Lipos that I'm using... (KIDDING!!! )

I actually was going to do that this evening to two of the 4-packs I have. I use them for other applications as well, so I can't have them all with short wires.

I also have 4 2100mah 25C NeuPower 2S packs, which I weighed this morning and that weigh 4.2oz, vs. 4.8oz for these ThunderPowers, but I think that the extra C-rating will make more of a difference on lap 2 than the weight, so I'm going to stick with the ThunderPower packs for the record attempts.

I also noticed that I can get the pack a little closer to the hull centerline if I trim away a little on the side of the motor mount, so I may pull that tonight and trim it up a little. Every little bit helps...

[Darin Jordan]

I thought you gave up on a carbon rudder?

Not quite yet. I think this will work fine. We'll find out shortly. It's REALLY light...

[sailr]

I thought 2S was N2? Guess I'm confused. What constitutes N1? Thought that was just 3.7V? I'm not very good about keepin up with the rules. ;-)